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Desperate - confused by quotes for building web site

Let me apologize if I have posted this in the wrong place, but my knowledge is limited, and I'm at my wits end. I have an idea for a retail website that I would like to peruse. I contacted maybe 15 web developers for quotes and I have received a wide range of responses over the past few weeks. Anywhere from $2,000 to $15,000 to have a website developed. This really made me confused with the price difference, so I asked more questions. One developer will say I need to use Joomal, another says wordpress, and on and on. Through my frustration I contacted some family members with websites who encouraged me to build my own. I question my own abilities since I don't know much and would rather pay to have it done properly. The problem is, the more I read, the more confused I get. I just need some solid advice on which way to turn as far as the platform so I can decide which developer to use. I don't need a huge website (like eastbay.com) because I will probably only sell maybe 100-500 products even if the business exceeds my expectations.

This is an example of the type of website I would like to build. To me it doesn't seem like anything special. Would it be possible to do this in wordpress, and still have it be mobile friendly and modern? I want to be able to edit the information myself so I can update the products. I also want it to be linkable to other websites and the usual things.

1. Given your lack of knowledge, it is probably best if you have the site written for you. If so, ask prospective contractors for details of existing sites they have built, and see if:
a) They meet your needs.
b) You like them.

2. The desire to amend the web site yourself is a problem, given your lack of knowledge. The best (but most difficult to maintain) sites written for you are likely to be hand-coded rather than written in a CMS.

3. If you want to learn how to develop and maintain a site yourself, its probably best to treat that as a separate project from the building/maintenance of the live site, at least until you gain confidence. In which case, it would make sense for you to learn whatever development system your live site is built in.

There are at least 2 aspects to building a website: web design and web development (although for high-end sites there are more disciplines involved, but for your situation I think you will need both web design and development).

For web design, you can choose a pre-made template from as little as 15 dollars, or you could get somebody to create you a bespoke template from upwards of $1,000 dollars. The reason there is so much variance in the price is partly reflective of the quality of the service. For example, for $50 you could find a kid with a camera to shoot your wedding day with an IPhone.

If approaching web developers, you should itemise your desired functionality and then use that as a discussion point with developers. You might be surprise with how much functionality is involved. For example, on the NoKipple website the following decisions have been made:

- We want the logo to be clickable, and link to the homepage
- We want a dropdown menu that contains editable images and a link to 'view all'
- We want social media links
- We want to show our latest products
- We want to show the users shopping cart, even if they are logged out.
- We want to show a sign up link
- We want a newsletter
- We want a slider that is editable, and contains a 'buy now' button

Even though these items might seem obvious, each of them could involve work for the developers, so they would appreciate you having a clear idea of what you would like on your site.

To answer one of your questions (!), you would be able to do this in Wordpress but you will have a learning curve ahead of you. There is also something called Shopify that you can get a trial version of. It seems one of the simpler solutions to use. I used it only briefly but it looks quite user friendly. It's not free but if your shop is successful then it might pay for itself (and if it's unsuccessful then you could stop paying the Shopify fee).

hello Talleagle,
Thank you for some usable information and explanation. I bought a template from flatastic. It has the features that I was looking plus more that I really knew nothing about. It's made in the joomla format. I have to admit, even after having everything done for you, editing the website is a daunting task for me. It's going to take time, but after going back and forth with developers I decided to try my hand. It's just going to take me awhile to learn how to navigate joomla menus and to learn what everything does. At the very least, I will have a much better idea of what Im paying for if I have to use a developer in the future.